The Daylight Gate

"Set during one of the most tumultuous periods in England's history, Jeanette Winterson's novel centers on the suspicions of witchcraft dominating the region of Lancaster during the reign of James I, a paranoid, self-appointed authority on the practice. Magistrates are sent to investigate and a family ensconced in a crumbling tower are soon indicted and their matriarch is thrown in prison. The landowner is also suspected, and it is in Alice Nutting, Winterson's strong heroine, that we come to know as the story unfolds. Winterson as always writes powerfully, and places vigorous words and deeds in her female characters who battle ignorance, jealousy, and domination by the men around them. Winterson's is a dark, sometimes grisly tale of what ends men have sometimes taken to repress an independent-minded, intelligent woman."